The Complete Yes Minister

Then, with every bit of the meal, Humphrey had a new idea. Rump steak suggested to him the Meat Marketing Board; but I don’t know a damn thing about meat. The fact that I eat it is not quite a close enough connection. So the Meat and Livestock Commission was ruled out too. I’d ordered Dover Sole, it reminded H. of the White Fish Authority. And, as the veg. arrived, he suggested the Potato Marketing Board, the Governors of the National Vegetable Research Station, the National Biological Standards Board, or the Arable Crops and Forage Board.

With the wine he suggested the Food and Drink Training Board. When I asked for mustard he mentioned the Food Additives and Contaminants Committee, and when we saw a Steak Diane being flambéed at the next table he offered the Fire Services Examination Board, the British Safety Council, and the St John’s Ambulance.

Of course, all of this was to make his point that he too was demanding a quid pro quo. But it was rather humiliating because after all this he asked me rather querulously: if I knew nothing about any of these quangos, what did I know about? I was forced to explain that there was nothing I knew about particularly — after all, I’m a banker. It’s not required.

Then he asked me if there were any minority groups that I could represent. I suggested bankers. We are definitely in a minority. He didn’t seem to think that was the answer.

He explained to me that the ideal quango appointee is a black, Welsh, disabled woman trades unionist. He asked me if I knew one of them, but I don’t.

I remarked that women are not a minority group and nor are trades unionists. Humphrey agreed, but explained that they share the same paranoia which is, after all, the distinguishing feature of any minority group.

So at the end of this whole rigmarole he was basically saying that my quango chances boil down to his Ministry’s Industry Co-Partnership Commission, the Chairmanship of which is within the gift of his Minister.

It sounds ideal, actually. There’s lots of papers but Old Humph. made it quite clear that it’s not awfully necessary to read them; that, in fact he’d be delighted if I didn’t bother so that I wouldn’t have too much to say at the monthly meetings.

So it looks like we’ll be scratching each other’s backs. I’ll have a word with my board, he’ll have a word with his Minister, and I’ll see you on the beach next week.

Your loving

Desi-pooh.

March 5th

Had a very worrying conversation with Roy, my driver, today. Didn’t see him after recording the broadcast yesterday, because I was given a relief driver.

Roy asked me how the recording went. I said it had gone very well, that I’d talked about government partnership with industry, and that there was a most interesting project going on up in the Midlands.

I assumed he wouldn’t have heard of it. I was wrong.

‘You don’t mean the Solihull project, sir?’

I was astonished. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘You’ve heard of it.’

Roy chuckled.

I waited, but he said nothing. ‘What are you laughing at?’ I asked.

‘Nothing, sir,’ he said. Then he chuckled again.

He’d obviously heard something.

‘What have you heard?’ I asked.

‘Nothing. Really.’

I could see his face in the rear-view mirror. He was smiling. I didn’t like it.

He was obviously laughing at some aspect of the Solihull project. But what? For some reason, I felt a need to defend it. To my driver? I must be cracking up. But I said, ‘We regard it as a shining example of a successful collaboration between government and private enterprise.’

Roy chuckled again. He was really getting on my nerves.

‘Roy, what’s so funny?’ I demanded. ‘What do you know about all this?’

‘No more than you might pick up on about thirty journeys between the DAA and Mr Michael Bradley’s Office, 44 Farringdon Street, and 129 Birmingham Road, Solihull,’ he replied.

‘Thirty journeys?’ I was astonished. ‘Who with?’

‘Oh,’ said Roy cheerfully, ‘your predecessor, sir, and Sir Humphrey, mostly.’ He chuckled again. I could have killed him. What’s so bloody funny, I’d like to know? ‘Very cheerful they were on the first few trips. They kept talking about shining examples of successful collaboration and suchlike. Then…’, he paused for effect, ‘… then the gloom started to come down, if you know what I mean, sir?’

Gloom? What did he mean, gloom? ‘Gloom?’

‘Well, no, not gloom, exactly,’ said Roy and I relaxed momentarily. ‘More like desperation really.’

My own mood was also moving inexorably from gloom to desperation. ‘Desperation?’ I asked.

‘Well,’ said Roy. ‘You’re the one who knows the background, aren’t you, sir?’

I nodded. ‘Yes I am.’ I suppose I must have been a trifle unconvincing because my damn driver chuckled again.

‘Was there… um… any… er… any particular bit of the background you were thinking of?’ I tried to ask in a casual sort of way, still in a state of total mental chaos.

‘No,’ Roy said firmly. ‘I mean, when something’s fishy, it’s just fishy isn’t it? You don’t know which particular bit the smell’s coming from.’